Early in the week, what is left of NASA landed a new rover on Mars named "Curiosity". It was a stunning achievement in the world of engineering, as the landing had to take place over the course of several stages being directed from 350 million miles away and they only got one shot. But, after a few minutes of radio silence, everyone at mission control was able to exhale and celebrate, as the rover started sending back the first images. It was such a delicate and complicated operation that the Discovery Channel had a documentary about the entire process ready to go the very next day. I guess it's good for both NASA and the Discovery Channel that all went well, because otherwise that is a totally different show. "Curiosity" is now exploring the red planet with the most sophisticated equipment which has ever been sent. Even if you weren't blown away by the pictures (spoiler alert: Mars is barren and dusty), it is still amazing that human built something which is now working on another planet.
However, the second emotion this news fills me with is annoyance because it basically proves that it is not that we can't keep exploring space, it is that we won't. I know it costs untold billions of dollars, but no one ever said knowledge was cheap. My inner sci-fi nerd still can't believe we have abandoned exploring space and, judging from the number of people whose Google searches lead them to a blog post I wrote years ago wondering why humans never try to go to the moon anymore, I am hardly the only one who doesn't like this development. On top of that people are lining up to spend millions of dollars to be taken to the International Space Station just to cross it off their personal bucket list, so it is not like there aren't rich nerds we could exploit. I'm not saying I need daily shuttles to the Moon for shopping trips, I would just take comfort in knowing that there are still people out there who are curious and want to keep exploring.
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